The total content of phenols and flavonoids of Silene dichotoma and Silene colorata and evaluation of the antioxidant activity of some of their extracts.

Abstract

In this research, organic extracts of varying polarity were prepared by cold maceration method for two species of the genus Silene L. in Syria, namely:  S. colorata and S. dichotoma, which belong to the Caryophyllaceae family, and then some secondary metabolites were detected, including alkaloids, tannins, cardiac glycosides, Di- and tri-turpentines and steroids in the studied species.

The content of total phenols and flavonoids in the aerial parts of the two species was determined using colorimetric methods, where the content of total

phenols in S. dichotoma was highest in both aqueous and methanolic extracts (463.06±0.01 - 364.2±0.03 GAmg/g, respectively).

The results showed that the amount of flavonoids was highest in the species Silene dichotoma in both the aqueous and chloroform extracts (5.41±0.22 mgQE/g - 19.46±0.01), respectively, and the species Silene colorata was superior in the content of flavonoids in the methanol extract (62.65±0.01 mgQE/g).

The anti-oxidant activity of extracts at different concentrations was tested by inhibiting the free radical DPPH, and a high scavenging rate was observed for the methanol extract in the two species studied, and this corresponds to the high concentration of phenolic and flavonoid compounds in this extract.